Light!

This post is going to be a little technical. It's because I had to go through a small technical ordeal recently before I finally succeded in mounting my new lamp in the living room. Germany is one of those countries where it is legal to attach your electrical devices to the power grid by yourself. For your own sake, however, you should switch off the respective circuit breaker in order to avoid shocking yourself. (Germany's effective AC voltage is 230 V after all; i.e., twice the number of North America.) Electric cables that run throughout the wall of a house are typically three-conductors, as shown in the schematic below (which I picked from the depths of the Internet).

three-conductor Schuko ("Schutzkontakt", or protected contact) cable

I have never seen the electric wiring of a house in North America, but since my new lamp had the contacts labeled in several languages, including English, I assume that the system there is somewhat comparable. I'm outlining it here merely to explain my challenge the other day.

In Germany the yellow-and-green wire is ground. In the German vernacular the blue wire is called Null, and the brown wire (which often is actually a black one) is called Phase, yet the technical terms are Neutral and Live, respectively. The Neutral wire is grounded as well (somewhere in the grid), while the Live wire is not. Therefore it is (usually) possible to identify the Live wire with a device as simple as a one-contact neon test light - the Neutral wire won't make the test light glow.

When I had removed the old lamp from the ceiling of my living room and replaced it with the new one by attaching the wires in the cable coming from the ceiling to the ones with matching colors on the lamp, I was quite frustrated that it did not work. It was actually getting late that night, and I was going to have guests the next evening, so I really wanted the lamp to work. I was quite surprised that I didn't even manage to get the old lamp back to work, which is essentially just a light bulb with a metal screen. Then I started to fumble around with the test light, only to find out that both the brown and the blue wire were making it respond. That's when I decided to call my landlady to make an appointment with an electrician.

Fortunately my landlady has excellent connections to all kinds of repairmen - all of her four sons are actually in plumbing or woodworking or similar trades. So the electrician came to my apartment the morning after I had called my landlady, and while I was secretly afraid of having accidentally connected the brown and blue wire by putting a screw into the ceiling, it turned out the problem was very simple, but beyond my experience as a household craftsman ...

I learned that the blue and brown wire were actually both used as Live, but attached to two separate toggle switches on the wall (the double kind that occupies the space of one single switch, or one power outlet - I had actually been wondering why there was such a double switch). The yellow-and-green wire was used as Neutral, and there was no separate wire for ground. Now it all started to make sense - I did observe the blue and brown wire both making the test light respond, but every time I had toggled both switches on the wall, so both wires were live then. The double switch, as I was told, served to address the two halves of a large lamp with, say, eight light bulbs, so each switch could light up a subset of four bulbs. Still, while technically possible, this way of wiring is not the best, as for once it does require an extra connection to ground, which needs to be provided inside the lamp, by hooking up the yellow-and-green also to the housing of the lamp. (Fortunately this was already installed in the new lamp anyways.)

Currently I am using brown as Live, and yellow-and-green as Neutral, which is also grounded inside the lamp as a protective measure. Blue, however, is not serving any purpose, and is thus just dangling inside the lamp - with the end capped by a luster terminal, of course! Likewise, one half of the double switch is pointless as well. But as long as my beautiful new lamp is safely able to light the entire living room, I am quite okay with that!

Since I couldn't have my guests over as planned, we postponed the dinner night by a few days, but it took place eventually. See below for a few photos of the prepared table, and - of course - of the working lamp!

starters: king prawns in homemade cocktail sauce, and little scoops from cantaloupe and galia melon

new lamp working orderly - it's just a demonstration, as there is still lots of daylight outside

Lake Constance

This text will be a rather short one, as I would like to share with you the impression from my recent trip to Lake Constance. In a way it was a trip to the past, as many years ago I had the pleasure of dating a very lovely lady who used to live on the lakeside. As far as I know her parents are still there; yet on the far side from the place I recently visited. The lady's name was not Constance, by the way, but Katja - Constance is actually an important town at the lake. The lake's German name, Bodensee, translates as Lake Bottom. I won't try cracking any jokes by establishing a connection between "Katja" and "bottom" ... not least because I fear if I did, Katja (who is a strong person) would kick my own behind straight to the shores of the Netherworld (or at least to the "Popokatjapetl" ...). I am not sure where the German name originates from, but the lake is certainly located at the southern end (the "bottom"?) of Germany, where it forms part of the borders with Switzerland and Austria, respectively.

Katja is not the one who gave me the second most difficult time of my life. While she was the one to end our rather short relationship, she made an effort to mitigate our differences, so as to stay friends truly. I won't forget!

I hope you will enjoy browsing though my photos as much as I did taking them.

view across Lake Constance, with the Alps in the background

There is snow on top of the higher mountains ...

... yet not everywhere.

The clouds were impressive that day

a peek through the wood

very majestic

From this bench one can admire the tiny island, and the rest of the breathtaking view.

These settings best reflect the human view of the site from that day.

The settings used here, however, are better suited to cheer humans up a bit.

First Communion of my godchild

Since the year 2003, I have been the proud godfather of Xavier Venou Walter, first-born son to my high school friends Simone (née Quien), and Dominik. Interestingly, Xavier's and my birthday are only seven days apart (with him coming first in the calendar year).

Being a godfather in the original sense of the word is a religious duty, rather than a rank in a syndicate ... but I do try to be as close to Xavi that we can be called "partners in crime". Nevertheless, the obligations that come with it are part worldly, part otherwordly. I am encouraged to be a special friend, yet I am supposed to be a role model Catholic as well. The latter would be at odds with my personal beliefs, and I admit that this caused me so much distress that at first I had rejected the honor, but then later (after good advice from similarly not-so-Catholic-role-model people) changed my mind, with the blessing of Xavier's parents.

Previously I have given account of the three most difficult periods of my life (yet). Those made it top three because one way or another I felt being bullied at the respective time; by a colleague, by the pain of a failed relationship (but not by the ex-partner herself , of course), and by the bleak odds of getting hired during a global economic crisis. However, the hardship of said breakup was intensified by a very disappointing experience at the end of my time as an undergraduate student. - At the time the highest and also the only undergraduate degree awarded in a Department of Chemistry was that of Diplomchemiker (for those who did not follow a hybrid curriculum with significant time spent on business and economics), which required a four-year course load that was actually more equivalent to the Anglosaxon Master's, as it did comprise certain classes even at the 400 and 500 level, and a thesis that was actually given less time (6-12 months) than a Master's (1-2 years). In my case the thesis was the very last academic challenge, tackled even after the finals. I very much looked forward to it, as it marked a significant change. From then on I was no longer required to nerdly memorize a cohort of bible-sized books, but allowed, even encouraged, to give in to my urge to play around and research. Or so I thought. Turns out, my advisor had little interest in my success, or that of the other Diplomands, he only wanted cheap labor to have his lab equipment assembled. That means he cared more about his machinery being set up that giving us the time we needed to actually use it. To cut a long story short, it was a bad combination of both scientific and managerial incompetence from which I was appalled enough to eventually pursue my PhD elsewhere ... in Berlin. (Yay!) So, there I was (in 2002/2003), still recovering from a bad breakup, sad about not being in Glasgow anymore (read about my Erasmus semester here), upset by the fact that my finals got delayed by the provicial powertrip of a scientific staffer (I'll tell about that another time), grieved by the death of my maternal grandmother, and ultimately disappointed by the (at best) non-existing scientific guidance from my so-called advisor ...

Imagine how emboldened I felt by this generous offer by Simone and Dominik! (Guys, if you ever wondered about the dedication I put in your copy of my Diploma thesis, now you know.) While the title of this post refers just to his First Communion, this holiday has inspired me to reflect a little on the time we have spent together so far. The pride of being entrusted with an important duty has more than outweighed the various difficulties life has had in stash for me since then. This pride got renewed on multiple occasions, whenever I realized that I actually did manage to make a difference for Xavier. I cannot tell you without boasting about it, but I am quite flattered when Xavier tells me that he considers a career in Chemistry ... even thought I feel I should maybe try to protect him from that ... So I he sees in me a role model after all! That makes me think that I may have gotten the better end of the deal ...

Here are some photos after the ceremony at church.

The star of the show, along with his cousin Charlotte, and his father Dominik (purple tie): Xavier Venou Walter.

mother and daughter

Dominik's sister and Xavier's godmother, Annkathrin, along with her family: husband Peter, daughter Charlotte, son Laurenz (in the baby stroller)

after church, at home

the menu

Xavier and Charlotte (I have always wondered if anybody ever read all the books you see in the background.)

great-grandmother Hilde

the three daughters of Hilde (grandma Lissy to the right; grandpa Ferdi in the left background)

proud parents

Xavier checking out the buffet

This is actually a cake!

a drummer and a Latin teacher

the rest of the band: grandpa Ferdi on the bass!